Sink or Swim
by Enochian Whisperer
Summary: [Season 8 Finale/9 Premiere UA] Inias is alive, and this is the Fall as he experienced it. With angered angels gearing to hunt down Castiel, Inias must race the clock to find his commanding officer.


It was awful. Absolutely horrific.

Inias was unfortunate enough to have been in Heaven when it happened.

Inias had been on his way to deliver a report to one of his newly-appointed superiors. After Hester was killed and Kevin Tran was abducted by Edgar, Castiel's garrison became scattered. All of his soldiers either went into hiding or perished at the hands of the Leviathan. Inias wisely retreated back home and dared not return until those abominations were purged from the world. However, Inias and those of his fellow soldiers who survived were then gathered by the angel Naomi, and made into canon fodder. Those who survived were sacrificed in the incursion to jailbreak Castiel from Purgatory. He was lucky to have survived.

But Inias would've gladly risked his own life for Castiel without Naomi's influence. Naomi didn't know that. She never would know that.

He didn't know what was happening, but he felt a nasty tear, which sent his body into shock. It was so painful that the scream in his throat was choked out. Inias saw the same exact pain shred through an unnamed sister who had just walked by him. She curled in on herself in agony, just as he did. Then they dropped through the floor, as though an anchor had been shackled to their necks.

A torrent of energy rushed around him, and he screamed, angelic voice breaking through the sound barrier and mingling with the distressed shrieks of his brothers and sisters. In the panic, he hear a few voices crying out for their Father, for salvation from this nightmare. It felt like knives were carving Inias up from the inside out. He was sure he was going to die.

An explosion blasted around him, and suddenly he was plummeting to Earth. It was dark as the night, and the air was mercilessly cold, shooting over him as he whizzed downward like a bullet punched from the chamber of a gun. It was cold, but it was burning hot at the same time. As the angel picked up velocity, he caught fire. Inias couldn't see anything around him through the blinding light, but terror poisoned every fiber of his being, locking up his bodily joints. He was paralyzed. A single thought reeled through his mind again and again and again at lightning speed.

_I'm falling!_

Angelic voices screamed all around him in a continuous ring. He was all too aware that his siblings were _dying around him_, and he was helpless to stop it. Inias had found himself privately questioning God in recent times, something he'd never before dared to do, but for the first time, he at last crossed that line he swore to never cross, and his voice wailed, "FATHER, WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN US?!"

Inias seemed to fall forever. It seemed like the horror would never end. He longed for Death's sweet embrace as the coils of hellfire raging in his bones and celestial essence grew ever hotter.

Faster than lightning, Inias splashed down. His body plunged into a body of water so fast that the impact's sudden deceleration nearly made him black out.

The fire was quenched, much to his intense relief, and his body felt almost weightless, suspended in the murky depths of nearly a hundred feet. The angel, now fallen, felt an incredible screech from the juncture of his shoulder blades and he nearly let himself sink for the sake of not agitating his injuries, except even with water clogging up his human ears, he could still hear his siblings pitching distress calls. Inias clawed for the surface. He wasn't a very good swimmer, but the agonizing ascent was made. His head shattered the barrier, and he gasped thickly, arms flailing as he struggled to tread water. Inias's eyes darted about frantically while trying to keep his head up. He could really feel the weight of his clothes now. His pale eyes inevitably turned up toward the heavens, and he watched as his siblings kept coming, popping out of the starry sky like flaming seeds. Like meteors.

It got to the point where Inias couldn't bear it anymore. He flipped the switch on his internal transceiver, and everyone went radio silent. He could block out their voices, but he couldn't block out the sounds of the light show itself, the sky seething angrily as angels free-fell to Earth. His face twisted up in despair, and a sob cracked his voice box. The angel craned his body, trying to keep a lid on this onslaught of emotion, and searched for land. Any kind of land. Thankfully he found some. City lights shimmered miles off, and he made for them, paddling his arms and kicking his legs to the best of his ability.

Inias heard a shout over the sloping waves.

He stopped and looked around. He cringed against his own pain, and surveyed his surroundings. A ways off, he spotted a sibling in need. They were struggling to keep themselves afloat. If he didn't help them, they'd drown.

Could angels, even fallen ones, drown?

Inias thrust himself in his sibling's direction.

"I'M COMING!" he shouted to them, in hope that they'd hear. But when he arrived, the other celestial was nowhere to be found. He glanced around in all directions. "..._No- No, no, no–_" The angel took a deep breath, and swam down, kicking away the surface. He couldn't see anything in the water. It was too dark. He resurfaced, spewing air. His voice was getting the better of him again.

Inias learned at that moment, that in this world, you either sink or you swim.

—

The waves heartlessly shoved Inias up onto the beach. He stumbled and fell hard, crashing into the foamy water as it receded around him. He coughed and sputtered when salt entered his nose and throat. He tried getting up, but when he was upright, the ocean had a knack for forcing him back onto his hands and knees. He crawled the rest of the way to dry land, dragging his formal clothes through muddy sand and grit from ground up seashells and various other deposits. The angel's dark hair was plastered to his head and face. When at least he was out of the sea's reach, Inias collapsed on his stomach, and just inhaled the saltine air. His shoulder blades were on fire and he didn't want to move.

The thundering sky was relentless, and it caused him to roll over and sit up to watch the fireworks. Passively, he sat there, accepted defeat, and watched on as the last of his brothers and sisters rained down from Heaven. He watched as some of the lights burned out before they touched down—he wondered if those siblings had died at those exact moments. He wondered how many of those siblings would sink or swim.

Far upshore, Inias saw one of the angels splash down what he believed was pretty close to dry land, much closer than he himself landed, and he was on his feet in an instant—though his shoulders almost had him keeling over. A second wind revitalized the angel, and he staggered forward due north along the sandy expanse. Little grunts bubbled in his throat as he got closer and closer, as just as he suspected, he spotted a brother out in the water, struggling.

Inias sprang into the oncoming water without second thought.

He swam out to meet his brother, and assured him that they would get to land safely. This brother of his proved to be an even worse swimmer, and was a burden to lead to shore. Inias dragged him up onto the dry sand, fighting the waves kicking them both. His rescued sibling was a muscled man, as he realized, with a bigger build than himself. Together they lay on the beach, until the brother sat up mechanically and stared out onto the water in silence. By now the sky had closed itself up again, and all was eerily quiet. Inias then saw the pain on the other angel's face, and he urged him, "Brother, shut it off."

"...It's his fault," said the angel brokenly, yet with anger aflame.

"What?"

"_Castiel_."

The name struck an instant chord.

"Brother, what do you mean?" Inias inquired carefully.

"You didn't hear it?" the other angel stared at him with uncomfortably wide eyes. Inias shook his head. "_He did this to us_. The Angel Tablet has been _activated_."

It pained Inias to even think that his old commander could be behind this atrocity, but he unfortunately couldn't find it within himself to put it past him. Castiel had a track record of screw-ups mounting, and he seemed to have outdone himself this time. '_Castiel, what have you done?_' Inias wondered ruefully.

The other angel rose to his feet, alerting him, and he rose with him.

"Brother, what is it?" he asked. He wasn't sure he was liking the look of those clenched fists. Or his distant gaze. Inias doubted he turned off his transceiver after all.

"...Castiel had _help_."

This was surprising to him.

"Help? From who?"

"_Metatron_."

The archangel's name came out so solidly that Inias couldn't speak for a moment.

"_—Metatron?_ The _Scribe of God?_" It was common knowledge that Metatron had abandoned Heaven near the Beginning, but it was common misconception that lead the whole of the Heavenly Host to believe that he was dead.

"_He's back,_" said the hardened brother, "_And he's exacted his revenge upon us all._"

Inias mulled this over. He remembered that Metatron had been so suddenly promoted, so suddenly blessed to sit in God's shadow, that it incurred the envy and wrath from many angels. Why _him?_ Why was _he_ so special? Castiel's subordinate was ashamed to admit that he himself had harbored a tinge of resentment towards Metatron back in the day. He would've killed for an opportunity like that, and that was by no means an exaggeration.

The full weight of his brother's statement then hit him with such force that he doubled over, moaning frightfully. The other angel turned to him with concern etched on his face, yet none of it spilled from his lips.

"_Oh no_," Inias breathed, "_Oh no, this isn't good-_"

"What made you think it _was?_" challenged his companion. Inias peered up at him wordlessly.

"..._I have to find him_-"

"What?"

"CASTIEL!" Inias shouted, stepping forward as he turned his transceiver back on. A flood of still-panicked voices jammed themselves in his head, but he pressed, "CASTIEL, WHERE–" He was grabbed from behind and a startled yelp cut him off as he was hauled back toward the water. Inias writhed as his ankles dug into the sand vainly for anchorage. "NO! STOP-!"

The other angel shoved him back, and he staggered, falling back onto his haunches, landing back in the water. Terror stricken in his eyes, Inias looked up at the soldier towering over him, as the seawater water licked up around him. Immediately he summoned an angel blade from his sleeve, ready to defend himself. But his brother only looked upon him coldly.

"...You're one of them," he said at last. Inias stared at him, unwilling to budge.

"...One of what?" he asked cautiously.

"Castiel's disciples."

This threw him.

"Disciples? What– Where did that come from?"

His brother then stooped down, getting nerve-wrackingly close to his face, and Inias scooted back.

"Castiel is a _wanted man_," said the angel, eyes locked on him, "Be careful about openly expressing your affiliation with him, past _or_ present."

A look of bizarre wonder crossed Inias's face. The other soldier saw this and frowned. Clearly this one was easily swooned.

"Listen to me, you fool," said the angel, "Our brothers and sisters are compromised. They are upset, enraged, and in pain. They will come looking for comeuppance. Castiel is now the target of their aggression, and they will stop at _nothing_-" He grabbed Inias's lapels roughly, startling him, "-until he is dead. Do you understand?"

"...Yes- yes, I understand-" Inias blinked and shook his lapels free. The other angel stood back up and offered Inias his hand.

"My name is Oren," his brother said.

"...Inias." He took his hand. Oren picked him up, and as soon as he was back on his feet, the other solider wheeled around and headed inland.

"Wait!" called Inias, stopping Oren in his tracks. "What about the others?" He pointed out to sea. He watched as sadness subtly morphed on his brother's face, before quickly being disguised again. He turned back around and kept walking.

"_Leave them,_" he said.

Inias took a few steps after him, then stopped and looked back one last time. He didn't see anything resembling a panicked angel out over the choppy waters. Aside from the ebbs and flows of the waves, nothing about this scenery did anything to suggest that just a half-hour earlier, angels were falling.


End file.
